LET THE FEEL OF THE WHEEL SEAL THE DEAL: Both UNC’s Roy Williams….  (Photo: http://www.unca.edu)

…and former Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo should be hawking used cars.  (Photo: Countrywide Financial)

Bud Fox News asks: Who had/has the tougher job- Williams or Mozilo? The latter makes a strong case: The former Chairman/CEO of Countrywide Financial and the tanned face of the housing crisis, Mozilo turned his company into the three-card monte dealer of the housing disaster, dishing out fraudulent mortgages to unqualified homebuyers at a pace that would embarrass even the sleaziest of liquor store owners peddling MD 20/20 and Wild Irish Rose to those who can’t say no to another round.

Then again, Williams is no slouch: The men’s basketball coach at “Public Ivy” University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill since 2003, whose tan sometimes rivals Mozilo’s, turned a blind eye to an academic scandal of almost Countrywide proportion, in which at least hundreds of football and basketball student-athletes were supposedly funneled through the African American Studies Department where their transcripts were rubber-stamped with grades at least good enough to maintain the athletes’ eligibility. Erstwhile Tar Heel Rashad McCants was a short-term beneficiary of the scam. According to the Sporting News:

In the fall of 2004, McCants failed two of his four classes (psychology and algebra) at UNC. Four months later, after leading the Tar Heels to the national title, after all that travel and all those late nights playing basketball and the month-long carnival that is tournament basketball, McCants finished the spring semester with straights A’s in four classes.

And Williams knew nothing about this unbelievable turnaround.

We on the sports desk at Bud Fox News believe Mozilo’s job was the tougher one. He wins on the sheer number of lives touched. It takes a herculean effort to play an instrumental role in the capsizing of an entire economy. Think of all the sad stories of personal bankruptcy that the tanned man of real estate has left in his wake.

All Williams has done is sell himself as a mentor and educator to a relatively small group of young men while in reality he exploits their athletic ability to justify his $2 million salary. Then on graduation day, he wishes well those not NBA-bound as they prepare to face the adult world, worthless diplomas in hand.

Don’t buy a used car from either one of them.